The Rubin Report/YouTube"One fears the advances of the Enlightenment are being deliberately pushed back," Fry said

Hinting at the reasons behind many of the controversial decisions made by student groups on campuses, Fry said: “Life is complicated and nobody wants to believe it. I suppose you might call it the infantilism of society.

"There is deep infantilism in the culture, in terms of the way they think, they can’t bear complexity."

He continued: “That you have to think, there are gradations, nobody wants that, they want to be told and to say: ‘This is good, this is bad’.

“On student campuses… There are many great plays which contain rapes, and the word rape now is even considered a rape.

“Or you can’t watch Macbeth because it’s got children being killed in it, it might trigger something when you were young that upset you once, because your uncle touched you in a nasty place, well I’m sorry."

The Rubin Report/YouTubeStephen Fry said that a growing 'infantilism' governs society's thoughts in an interview with American YouTube host Dave Rubin.

Fry continued: “It’s a great shame and we’re all very sorry that your uncle touched you in that nasty place – you get some of my sympathy – but your self pity gets none of my sympathy.

“Self pity is the ugliest emotion in humanity.

“Get rid of it, because no one’s going to like you if you feel sorry for yourself.

“The irony is we’ll feel sorry for you, if you stop feeling sorry for yourself. Just grow up.”

They’ve become, in a very ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ way, ‘unpersoned’

Fry also hit out at student campaigns across UK universities to remove statues of historical figures: "I think it started to happen in Britain with the attempted removal of statues of people who are considered unlikeable.

"They’ve become, in a very ‘Nineteen Eighty-Four’ way, ‘unpersoned’ and suddenly someone because they were an imperialist, Cecil Rhodes is the example I’m thinking of."